Evie is a nut. She is highly unmanageable, but we suspect she's been chained out back for several months.  I'll use different levels of reinforcement to elicit Changed Emotional Responses (CER) to make her be just Happy About Everything, then I'll start introducing manners slowly.   She tends to jump up and hump while clawing, pulls on-leash, and she needs work with some pretty heavy-duty mouthing as well as basic manners.  There might be something underlying that needs attention.  She's the perfect subject for immersion training, and I'm off for 6 days.

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Here is a link to help you understand more in-dept what we're working on, and how it's going:  Foster Evie Notes

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On 2/26/22, I really struggled with whether or not to continue trying to work with Evie... there were alot of factors working against us: she's 8 mos old (teenager stuff),  her breed mix (high energy, high intelligence... a double-edged sword), and her life until now, which we suspect was spent tied to a tree in someone's back yard.  I felt like I wasn't making a dent in the mouthing behavior, and I really felt that this was the behavior that was going to cost her a chance... it was truly awful.  She had a lot of behaviors that had to be extinguished., and this type of training is VERY intensive.  I noticed that night as Hubby and I were talking that several times Evie jumped up and laid a paw on my leg.... she didn't mouth me.  The following morning 2/27 , she's still on the tether, either on-leash or on the long tether outside.  I've taken her for a walk, she chewed for a bit on a stuffed Kong, she's been out to pee twice... she's only mouthed me TWICE in all that.  Not only that, but as soon as I say "huh-uh" she STOPS mouthing me, and sits.  In researching extinction bursts, there is evidence that they often become much worse just before they're extinguished.  I'm hopeful.